Letter to Congress Signatories: End Bush Tax Cuts for Top Incomes

Co-Sponsored by Business for Shared Prosperity and American Sustainable Business Council

Signatories follow text of letter below - more than 600 to date

Dear Member of Congress,

We, the undersigned business owners and executives, urge you to oppose any efforts to extend the Bush tax cuts for income over $250,000.

In the last decade, we have been cutting taxes on the wealthiest Americans and underfunding vital programs to pay for them. Large and growing budget cuts have had a severe impact on business, particularly micro and small business and job creation – reducing funding for infrastructure improvements, community economic development programs, housing, job training and much more. America’s failing infrastructure is starved of funds and falling further behind our global competitors. These cuts have hurt America’s small- and medium-sized businesses and our communities.

Huge tax cuts for the richest Americans have not trickled down to increase small- and medium-sized business investment, broad based consumer purchasing power or job creation. More budget busting tax cuts for the top won’t help Main Street, won’t lead to business innovation, more hiring, or more people being educated for the jobs we have and can create.

As businesses owners, none of us hire more employees simply because someone gives us a tax cut. We hire more employees when our customers demand more of what we have to sell. When a teacher, firefighter or construction worker building public infrastructure loses his or her job, many of us also lose a customer.>

Those who claim that tax cuts help small businesses are guilty of identity theft. Less than 3 percent of tax filers with any business income make over $200,000 (individuals) or $250,000 (couples) per year, and many of those are not small business owners, much less small business owners with employees. They include K Street lobbyists, Wall Street investment partners, big business CEOs paid to sit on the boards of other big corporations, and wealthy people renting out their vacation homes.

The high-end tax cuts are hurting our economy. It’s time to end them, not extend them. This would be an important step in rebuilding an economy that grows our small businesses and middle class.

Sincerely,
David Levine, CEO, American Sustainable Business Council
Holly Sklar, Executive Director, Business for Shared Prosperity